Coffee House Etiquette
by chipofmintchocolate
Summary: Or what not to say when ordering a drink from an attractive blonde barista. Traught AU for chibipooh.


**Disclaimer: **Nope, not mine.

**Prompt:** (by chibipooh on Tumblr) "Traught (duh), Coffeeshop AU (I know it's cliche but I LOVE THEM SO MUCH)"

**Reply:** Nonsense! What is cliche about coffee shops? Personally, I think they are THE BEST)

**Note:** Inspired by chibipooh's lovely prompt and by a post bentfire reblogged that explained how not to be impolite in a coffee shop. Let's just say that in this AU, Dick breaks about half of those rules.

* * *

**Coffee House Etiquette**

* * *

"Sir. You're holding up the line."

Officer Dick Grayson thrust his hands deeper into the pockets of his black windbreaker with the Bludhaven Police Department insignia sewn to the front of it. His lower lip was puckered out, and his eyebrows were furrowed in exaggerated concentration.

Hearing the irritated murmurs of customers, the blonde barista's forced smile began to falter.

"If you can't decide what you want, move to the back of the line. Now," she said through clamped teeth.

Ignoring her thinly-concealed hostility, Dick hummed and continued to reread the chalkboard menu mounted behind her pretty head.

"There are just so many different roasts and flavors," he mumbled to himself, and a businessman behind him groaned, "and then there's the choice of 2% or whole, latte or cappuccino, iced or hot..."

Her fingers tightened around the drink-labeling sharpie in her hand. "Don't you have somewhere to be?"

"Yeah!" a lady in the back yelled, "Some of us have _jobs _to get to, idiot!"

"Alright alright!" he said, hands held up in mock surrender. "A frappuccino please."

His server's eye began to twitch. "We are not Starbucks. Please get out."

"Come on Artemis," when he casually mentioned her name, she covered her gold name-tag protectively, "don't act like you don't recognize me. I come here for coffee every morning."

"I don't remember faces of customers very well," she lied.

"Oh, but you must remember me!" he replied emphatically. "I come at the same time every day, and I always order the same drink."

Artemis' eyes narrowed, and she let out a long breath through her nose like an angry bull facing a matador. Of course she remembered him. How could she forget the guy who had made her new job miserable for the past ten days?!

But she refused to play his game and give in to his tomfoolery. With a guy like him involved, admitting recognition would be admitting defeat.

"A phone number is not an order."

She realized a second too late her comment had ruined her facade, and the persistent police officer perked up at the reference to his past visits.

"Oh you kept that napkin I left you? I thought you threw it away."

"...neither is flirting," she said, counting the reasons for her irritation on her fingers. "unwanted complements, suggestive comments, or orders for drinks that are not on our menu."

"You call me saying 'I like your hair. It's a very pretty color' or 'You're looking really beautiful today' a 'suggestive comment?' Geez, what's a guy to do when he wants to give a beautiful girl a complement nowadays?"

"Give them to someone who wants them," she said slowly, as if speaking to a child. "I don't. Buying coffee from this establishment and leaving gratuitously large tips does not give you the right to sexually harass me."

His behavior reminded her far too much of an ex-boyfriend she had broken up with right before she graduated college.

"I'm sorry; I'm sorry!" he said, the teasing tone draining from his voice when he realized the game was up.

The sudden shift in mood caught Artemis off guard, and she began to suspect the man of clinical insanity. Of course she had thought he was crazy from the moment she met him. But now the behavior of this (she was reluctant to admit even in the safety of her mind) extremely attractive officer had crossed the line from quirky and charming to downright bizarre.

Plus, at this point, he had scared away all her potential customers. She slowly inched towards the phone to call her manager.

He closed his eyes and began rubbing both of his temples with the fingers of one hand. "I've taken this way too far. With all the hints I kept dropping, I thought you'd figure it out by the third day. Or the fourth. Or the fifth..."

"I'm calling my manager. He'll make sure you can't step foot in this place for the rest of your..."

"No!" he pleaded and reached to stop her. She slapped his arm away and backed away from the counter, falling into the stance she had learned in her self-defense class.

Realizing how aggressive and insane his behavior looked, he retracted his hand and back-combed his fingers through his hair.

"Ugh, god dammit...it's...it's Dick Grayson," he admitted in pathetic defeat, his previously coiffed hair mussed beyond recognition. "...you know, from Gotham Academy? I went to school with you and Wally West."

Artemis Crock's jaw dropped, hanging so low that it looked like it had come unhinged.

Dear God, it was her exes best friend from high school! This specimen of male perfection was scrawny Richard Grayson from the class of 2014?!

The blood rushed to her face, from embarrassment or anger or _both_, she couldn't tell. All she knew was her cheeks were probably the color of a tan fire hydrant, and her ex-classmate had been coming to her workplace every day waiting for her to recognize him. How was she supposed to respond to that?

"Um, I know it's been six years, and it's okay if you don't remember me..."

The sound of his voice reset the verbal-communication function in her brain.

And the first thing that came out of her mouth was an outraged,

"YOU?!"

He balked. "Well that wasn't the reaction I was..."

"GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT!"

* * *

_Four days later..._

* * *

When a certain police officer sheepishly shuffled his way to the front of the line, drenched in rain after running a block in the downpour (there hadn't been any good parking spaces, and in his rush of sudden bravery to go back and make amends, he'd forgotten his umbrella and rain-jacket), Artemis was determined to ignore him.

"Look, I'm sorry about..."

"Do you want to buy something or not?"

He rattled off an order, "A medium macchiato, whole milk, two shots of espresso, no sugar."

The newly opened coffee house was currently understaffed, so Artemis prepared and delivered his drink to him herself.

"Thank you for your purchase. Please...don't come back again."

"When do you get off?" he asked as he gently took the coffee from her french-manicured fingertips.

"Dick," she snapped, "don't you need to go and do your job? Or are the rumors true and all you police officers do is sit around and eat donuts?"

"I took the graveyard shift from my buddy tonight, so I have all the time in the world today."

"Well, have you considered that maybe, just maybe, I don't have any time for you?"

"Look, I just want to talk. I know I didn't give you the best first impression...or...second first impression I suppose, but do you think you could give me another chance?"

In reply, she gave him a noncommittal sigh, but when he sat himself down to patiently wait until her shift was up, she didn't tell him to go away.

As she hung up her apron and prepped the space for the next employee without a glance in Dick's direction, he assumed the worst and started collecting his trash. He stuffed his napkin and stirrer in his coffee cup and tossed them both into the waste dispenser with a defeated sigh.

However, when he turned around, she was sitting at his old table, leaning back in her chair, and crossing her arms over her chest expectantly.

"Well, aren't you going to offer to buy me a drink?" she asked.

He smiled. "What would you like?"

"Iced tea. One lemon, no sugar."

"Got it."

He returned with two drinks in hand. An iced tea for her, and a free glass of water for himself.

Considering all the trouble he had given her, Artemis appreciated the fact that he didn't force a conversation on her. He simply sipped his water and let her dictate the terms of their interaction. The silence was slightly tense, but not uncomfortable.

"How did you find me?" she finally asked, her raspy voice cracking from overuse after her long day. "Use your detective skills to track me down?"

"Actually no," he said, her tone bringing a quirk to his lips. "A friend recommended me to a new coffee place ten minutes from the station, and I was lucky enough to come when you were working here."

To her surprise, she found herself believing him. "Why didn't you just tell me who you were when you first recognized me?"

He'd only given his first name "Richard" for his orders, and with all the credit cards she handled every day, she hadn't bothered to read the full name on the card.

"Um..." he scratched the side of his neck below his ear, a nervous habit she recognized from their school days. "I could tell right off the bat you didn't know who I was, and..."

"And you decided to be an obscure and roundabout dork as usual, leaving me to figure out what the hell was going on."

"Well that, and I didn't know how to go about reintroducing myself to my high school buddy's girlfriend..."

She lifted her lips from her straw, and her mouth twisted in a grimace.

"Ex-girlfriend. Wally and I broke up two years ago."

"Oh," he said as his eyes widened, "I'm sorry...I didn't know."

Her frown faded, replaced by an expression of bewilderment. She thought he had made a slip and accidentally said 'girlfriend' when he meant 'ex-girlfriend.' She hadn't suspected Dick, Wally's supposed heterosexual life partner, hadn't heard about the break-up.

"Didn't he tell you?"

Wally had acted as if he was keeping in touch with Dick in college, and the two boys had always been inseparable. Now that she could be honest with herself, she could admit their deep friendship probably had had a better chance of lasting into old age than her relationship with Wally ever did.

His posture slouched. "No."

"Oh," she said, not knowing how to answer the hurt she saw in his eyes.

"Yeah." Then the sadness disappeared from his features in a blink. "...so what brings you to Bludhaven? The high crime rate? The ridiculously overpriced real estate? The traffic? The insufferable people?"

"I'm got a scholarship for the Bludhaven University School of Business. And you're trying to change the conversation."

"Congratulations!" he said sincerely. "I've heard their business school is top-rate...and yeah, should of known you'd see through the act."

He sighed, and she rested her elbows on the table to lean in and listen to what he had to say.

"Wally and I haven't been close since his last year of high school. I'd ask why he didn't talk to you about it, but I think I already know the answer to that."

"...which is?"

"Please, don't blame yourself, because it isn't your fault..."

"Dick."

"Okay. The truth is, Wally didn't really want me in his life after I told him that I had been crushing on his girlfriend for two years."

Artemis stared blankly at him, and after a moment, she managed to squeak out a sputtered, "Oh?"

"Mm hm." He looked about as awkward as she felt, but his relaxed posture betrayed the sense of release the truth had allowed him.

"Sorry for burdening you with ancient history, but you have no idea how good it feels to come out with that. Wally was the only one I told. Well, him and Babs."

"Oh, didn't Barbara and you get together?"

"We dated on and off senior year, and I've been with a few other girls since then. But right now, there isn't anyone." He leaned back in his chair with a smile. "Just me...and good old-fashioned justice."

Artemis didn't miss his not-so-subtle reference to his single status, but instead of getting on his case, she let him get away with it.

"Good to know you have your social priorities straight."

"Who needs people when you have the law on your side?"

"Well then, I guess there's no point in asking if you'll be free this Saturday."

"Nope, no reason to...wait, what did you say?"

Before she turned and left the building, she snatched a pen from his front shirt pocket and scribbled a number on the back of his receipt.

"Here's for if you change your mind."


End file.
